My church friend from years ago, Hoy Fellure, posted this message on Facebook in response to my article: The Trump Has Sounded: “I’m concerned about you Mike. Your daily negative post about our President is over the top. You hardly ever posted anything on FB until after the election in November. Now you are relentless in opposing the actions by President Trump. May I suggest that you promote the positive points of the Democrat Party and how it can improve the conditions of America instead of the so called negative points of the Republican Party.”

Hoy — you are correct that recently I’ve been very active on FaceBook. Below are my posts from just the last two weeks. None of this is “fake news.” It is all mainstream news. This is not stuff I’m making up. I get that you may be irritated that I’m filling your Facebook feed with material that you’d rather not see. But this is a pretty good record of what I’ve read that I think is worthy of sharing.

Posting items on Facebook is a pretty feeble way of “opposing the actions of President Trump.” But when Trump’s actions are focused on destroying the ACA or funding private prisons, or appointing billionaire cabinet members whose agenda is to destroy their agencies, or denying climate change — even feeble opposition is better than no opposition.

You are failing to understand the urgency of my point of view that the election of Donald Trump is a huge wake-up call that our democratic republic is in a dangerous state of dysfunction. The tires are coming off. That someone like Donald Trump, a person of his values and history, could be elected president is shocking — as Mitt Romney and George H and George W Bush and many other reputable Republicans all emphasized prior to November 8. Now, for forty days and forty nights, Trump has been reminding us again and again how truly shocking it is that such a man should become president.

I get that you want to normalize Trump’s election. You need to consider why many people see his election as shocking and why so many are looking for an effective response. In my POV, the only hope I can see is for a revival of the citizenry — a great civic awakening. You are assuming that my flurry of posting on Facebook and my comments on FB are all about pushing a partisan point of view — that I’m all about advancing the Democratic Party. Wrong. My point is that we need to be pro-democracy, not pro-Democratic Party, nor pro-Trump. We need to create civic harmony, not civic division. In my “The Trump Has Sounded” post, I wrote: “The big question is: What is the root cause of our republic being so weak? Here is the sad fact: our democratic republican system of self-government is dysfunctional because it is lacking the informed and engaged citizenry that it needs in order to function as it should.”

Thanks for you concern for me. As Christians we need to pray for each other. All Christians need to find a way to work together to strengthen our citizenry so that our republican system of government will begin to work as it should. Partisan politics is destroying us. We need to find a common ground from which to work. I’m thinking that what should unite Christians is our sense of community. How could our Christian values unite us as a community — a community devoted to making our republican system work as it should. Here is a good question that I am dithering with: How can Christians transcend partisanship and work together to build community? How can Christians work together to make politics emerge from communities that are guided by Christian values?

These are the twenty-five posts I’ve made on FB in just the last two weeks. I can see why Hoy may be irritated that I’m flooding his feed with material he’d rather not see. Only four of these articles — shown in bold — were written by me and posted on my website DaytonOS.com. The other articles are from mainstream news like the Washington Post or the New York Times. You can find the links to these articles on my Facebook page here:

1. The Trump Has Sounded — Will The Dead Be Raised Incorruptible?
2. Trump Embraces ‘Enemy of the People,’ a Phrase With a Fraught History
3. AP fact check: Trump claims Affordable Care Act covered ‘very few’ people
4. Under Mr. Trump, Private Prisons Thrive Again
5. Bannon Admits Trump’s Cabinet Nominees Were Selected To Destroy Their Agencies
6. Trump’s Big Agenda — Privatize Everything In sight
7. Eulogy For My Friend: Rosie Hardin
8. ACTION ITEM — Mail postcards to Paul Ryan
9. ‘Medicare for All’ Only Way For Trump To Keep Healthcare Promises
10. Should Bannon Resign? He and Milo Fake-Newsed Hillary As Pedophile
11. 100 days of Trump claims
12. Note to William Wild: Build Structures Outside of Public Schools To Bring Excellence In Civics
13. Mandel defends spending $1.3 million in public money on TV ads
14. Humans causing climate to change 170 times faster than natural forces
15. Don’t Dismiss Trump’s Attacks on the Media as Mere Stupidity
16. Kasich: It’s a ‘bad idea’ to phase out Medicaid expansion
17. Climate Change Denial is the Original Fake News
18. Quit Calling Donald Trump and Isolationist. He’s worse than that.
19. Senate vote to repeal transparency rule for oil companies
20. China grants Trump a trademark he’s been seeking for a decade
21. Trump Science Adviser Candidate Calls Climate Science a “Cult”
22. Robertson: Opposition To Trump Is ReVolt Against God
23. Trump lots keep Palestinians Stateless forever
24. Congress Says, Let the Mentally Ill Buy Guns
25. America Needs A Great Civic Awakening

Names mean something. Maybe the name of our current president was foretold. Handel’s “Messiah” quotes 1 Corinthians: “For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

Donald Trump is a huge wake-up call. His election produced that stunned feeling when you first wake up like you are disorientated from reality. You must have been asleep — or maybe you were dead. Trump’s wake-up call has now been going for forty days and forty nights.

To wake up is to realize that our democracy is in a state of dangerous dysfunction. The evidence was clear long before Trump’s election. What do you call a government in which 90% of the members of its House of Representatives are embedded in “safe” seats, who never are questioned by their constituency, who never are required to give an accounting of their activity?  I don’t think you call such a government a democracy, because it is not.

If Trump doesn’t wake us up, what will? Trump’s election is a symptom of a deeper problem. In the big picture, the problem is not the Democratic Party or the Republican Party or gerrymandering, or big money in politics.  These are all aspects of system dysfunction. The big question is: What is the root cause of our republic being so weak? Here is the sad fact: our democratic republican system of self-government is dysfunctional because it is lacking the informed and engaged citizenry that it needs in order to function as it should.

To be raised incorruptible is to see the truth. The election of Trump should make informing and engaging the citizenry a big campaign. Here is what we need to envision and pray for:  a great civic awakening that will refresh our republic — a movement focused on civics education — focused on building an informed and engaged citizenry.

Rosie Hardin

Rosie Hardin passed away this last Monday.  She was born in May and her middle name was Mae. This next birthday, she would have been 95. Her services will be on Saturday. You may read her obituary here: George Martin Funeral Home. 

When Rosie was in the nursing home in Vandalia, she had one big worry. Rosie wanted to go home and one big reason was that every day she fed a squirrel on her back porch. She made a pet of that squirrel and named him “Hoppy.” She said he was very ornery.  When she was in the nursing home in Vandalia she was worried about Hoppy. She knew that squirrel loved her and counted on her and she loved that squirrel too.

Rosie loved animals. She loved plants and flowers. She loved children. She loved people. She loved her family. She loved me. And I’m sure she loved everyone in this room.

I enjoyed visiting Rosie — in her warmth and love, she reminded me a lot of my mom. One day I decided to tell Rosie that she had come to mean a lot to me. As I was preparing to go, I took her hand and said loudly, so I was sure she could hear, “I love you Rosie” and she said “I love you too.” And she gave me a big hug.  I tried to visit every week and every time after that day, that is how we said goodbye.

Rosie thought a lot about God. She wondered what heaven will be like. She talked about the great supper in heaven and wondered what the food would be like. Will we have bodies up there? Would she have a chance to fish? Could she sew something beautiful that God could wear?

Rosie loved to tell about the nice times she and Cecil had when they went fishing. She enjoyed catching the fish, but she never liked to eat fish. She repeated many times that she was so happy that Pastor Paul had helped Cecil to be saved and she was looking forward to seeing Cecil in heaven. She talked about the last cigarette she smoked and how she became so happy when she accepted Jesus. She marveled, “What do people do who do not have Jesus in their lives? How can they get along without Him?”

Rosie pondered the idea that God is spirit. She asked me, “Will we see God?”  I thought about it and finally told her:  Yes Rosie —  Jesus told us that “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,” and, I told her: Rosie you are pure in heart.

In Rosie, I saw Christ — pure in heart, full of love —

Rosie, I’m so happy that we became friends and I’m so happy that we will meet again. In my spirit, I can hear you answering me back one more time when I say:    I love you Rosie